At War With the Army (1950)

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“He’s gonna tell me how to run a business? He used to be a soda-jerk. He just run out of soda.” – Supply Sgt. Miller

Number of Times Seen – 1 (8 Apr 2019)

Brief Synopsis – A young soldier gets into a lot of trouble in training camp as the soldiers higher ranked than him constantly give him new duties during World War II.

My Take on it – When I came across this film, I decided o check it out solely du to its unique title.

Until the film began, I wasn’t even aware that this was one of the very first Dean Martin-Jerry Lewis comedies.

This film works quite well largely because of the fact that the chemistry between the two of them is near perfect.

They work extremely well together and after watching this film, it’s quite easy to understand how and why they ended up having such a long and successful career together.

The story here is pretty mediocre, but the jokes help make up for that fact quite a lot.

The comedy in this film is mostly verbal and the way things are written allows for so many humorous lines along the way.

This film allows the two comedians to work their verbal humor on one another nearly perfectly.

Bottom Line – Funny Martin and Lewis comedy that works quite well due to the great chemistry between the two. The story is a bit convoluted but it doesn’t matter much since many of the jokes still manage to hit home. The dialogue is written really well and they are able to use it in order to maximize the verbal humor throughout. It’s quite understandable as to why these two comedians ended up having a long and successful career as partners after seeing them work together here.

MovieRob’s Favorite Trivia – When Jerry Lewis and Dean Martin signed with Paramount Pictures, it was with the proviso that they could make one film outside the studio every year for their own company, York Productions. This film was the first fruit of that negotiation, with the stars exchanging their usual salary for a 90% cut of the profits. However, on the film’s release, the two found themselves in the midst of a protracted legal battle over their contract and the profits. After several years they relinquished all financial interest in the film in exchange for dropping their stipulation that they make films outside of Paramount. All the legal battles over the film are probably one of the main reasons why its copyright was not renewed in 1977, with the film ending up in the public domain. (From IMDB)